Ron + Hope: Unfiltered - Dealing With Anxiety With Guest: Chaz Carpenter

Hey, guys, man, you're our podcast family. And you know what? We're Ron and Hope. I think you can tell this ain't Hope today.

We're Ron and Chaz.

We're Ron and Hope. Unfiltered, real raw and relevant. I'm usually getting a swallow of water or drink of water, usually while Hope is saying that, I don't want you to go anywhere because, hey, I get it. Hope's much more fun to look at than looking at me. And not only that, she's kind of the life of the party, but I got something today that we circled on our calendar. Been looking forward a long time. So going to be talking about the subject of anxiety. And anxiety is not in. I'm having a rough spot, but in, like a diagnosis. I mean, somebody whose entire life was affected by it going to let Chaz begin to tell his story and also how he. How he walked out of that and also as a family, how we didn't know what was going on and how we tried to respond to it, because I don't know why the rise. I don't know if it is the way America is structured. I don't know if it's the way lifestyles are structured. I don't know if it's got something to do nutritional. I don't know what it is. But the fact that we have every preacher preaching on anxiety, the fact that there are so many shows on anxiety, the fact that there are more anxiety scriptures far than ever before and more in this country than any other country, something's happened. Something shifted. Something's happened. There's a reason that there's this struggle out there, and it's very real. So I want you to hang around a few minutes. Looking forward to a couple of sponsors and everything that we've got today, but thank you for being with us. We're going to try. Chaz was talking to me. Chaz is our middle child. We have Chase, we have Chaz, we have Chandlern. And in May, you turned 27. I believe it was 27. It's hard to believe I'm sitting here talking about kids being 29, 27, and 25, but he's the only one yet not married. He does have a girlfriend. He's been dating for a long time, but he has a very unique story. All my kids seem to carve out a story. Chase has told his story before many times. You've heard the testimonies of it. Chaz's was very, very different from that. And as a family, we learned a lot through it. And then he came triumphant through it. And I want you to hear kind of his journey, because this one has the possibility to really help some people. And I'm going to let him talk, but I also want to say this. Chad told me, he said right before this is on here, he said, I don't want this to be sad. And I said, somehow, you know, I think sometimes we look at our painful moments in life and we look back on them. Sometimes we have to laugh. Sometimes you just have to look back on it. You know, I hate that happened, but it was crazy. And now looking back on it, it's kind of comical. And so we're not trying to get in your life and pull you down and make you have a drab day. The fact is, he's sitting here healthy. He's sitting here. He's a project manager at Redemption. He's sitting here getting ready to take the entire church to a building program. He will be overseeing that process. He's been in training. This is his first career job. Graduated, graduated from college right in Covid. All that time, I know an investment to go to college. Didn't even get to walk, man, I hated that for him.

Graduated through a TV screen.

Yeah, I hated that. And went to Regent University, graduated from there, and then had to do it on a computer screen. So I really wanted him get the chance to walk. But we're here, he's a grown man, and we want to talk to you today. So let me tell you who this is the perfect broadcast for. If you yourself struggle occasionally, if you yourself have been diagnosed, if you have a family member in the house who has. I think I was raised holiness, Pentecost, miracles, good people. I say this all the time before I make a critique. I let them know my great love. I wouldn't change my heritage. I wouldn't change my church. I wouldn't change my parents. I would not change how I was raised. And the foundation that I was given is sacred to me. However, we did not believe in counselors. I'd never even heard of such a thing as a Christian counselor until I got to Bible school. I want you to understand, I didn't even know the thing existed because, you know, God handled things at the altar and that's where all of your emphasis went. And, you know, whatever it was, you bring it to the altar. There were church splits in the 40s, 50s and 60s over in our denomination, over whether or not to take medicine and go doctors and so somebody coming up, you know, a panic attack and fear and anxiety, you were going to the altar. Now, in some cases, rightfully so, because there can be the spirit of fear, and it doesn't respond to counsel and it doesn't respond to appeal. It responds to being broken and being cast out. However, I've always said if you buke it and it don't buke, it ain't a devil. Because if you rebuke the devil, the Bible tells me he has to go. When some symptoms stay, then maybe that is not the origin. So I'm not criticizing anybody and your method at dealing with your situation. I'm going to reveal and be vulnerable in some of my own cases. And there's nobody that believes in the power of God any more than me. But the fact is I've had my own different times in life, my own struggles where I had to seek out help. We'll talk about that. Jaz, some of what you went, what you felt and kind of when you started feeling, you know, 4, 5, 6, 7 years old, it's fuzzy to me now. But what were some of the things you experienced before we sought out help? What do you remember?

I mean, so I think that it was probably. It was. I mean, I was really young, and it was almost like it was just, like it just kind of appeared. Yeah.

Because I don't want gradual. You just kind of know.

And the thing is, a lot of people say that they can tie something to it. Like they say, oh, well, this, this, this happened to me, so it made me feel this way, or, or I developed this from that. But I don't have, like, I don't have a day where I can sit here and say, oh, this, this is what happened. I just remember as I got older, it just was continued to get worse. And, you know, I remember I went to probably five or six different schools, including, you know, being taken out and being homeschooled just because I ended up not being able to go to school.

So what was the feeling, though? Was it, was it fear? Was it panic?

It was it. It was fear of. Not of, of one. It was leaving the house, which I don't know why. So y' all remember I always had. I never went to friends houses. They always came to our house.

I remember.

And, and I couldn't, I can't explain why, but everyone. And my best friend, that's why I have a small friend group, because my best friends, they know that they're the ones that were there with me during that season. But it's hard to explain because I tell, I try to tell this to people that. People who haven't experienced that kind of anxiety, other than the normal kind of anxiety that's like, that a normal human has. For whatever reason, they don't, they can't understand it. They don't understand, you know, why you do the things you do or why you feel a certain way or, or, or, or whatever. But when you tell them that, they don't understand it because they haven't felt it. So it's. And it doesn't make sense. A lot of times I would feel those ways. I would have, like, intense fear or just like to the point of panic attacks, but I didn't know where it came from. I could just feel it. And as soon as it started, I just. I knew, you know, this. It was going to go. It was going to be bad, it was going to go downhill.

Now, as a parent, let me interject. That was tough to watch. I had no experience with that. And regretfully. And we've talked through this and I've apologized in so many ways. If I was ever out of line and responded to. I remember one of the first nights, I'd say you were 5ish. You were a small kid. There was one night we did our prayers. We always did our prayers. And then you made me take all of your stuffed animals and turn them toward the wall. Yeah.

And it sounds weird and funny and.

We can talk about it and smile now, but you had had some things. And I just thought up at that time you was being a little bit rebellious. You having an attitude with your dad. You know, I got to correct you, Chaz, we ain't doing this tonight. You know, stuff like that. Because I had no clue that you were struggling with something internal. I just thought you were being aggravating as a kid.

So that was, that was. That wasn't necessarily the anxiety. That was the ocd. That was like. I did like, you know, and your.

Child diagnosis was OCD and anxiety. That was your child diagnosis.

So, you know, people with OCD, especially, you know, who struggle with it really bad, they would. They do random things for no reason, but once they get in the thought in their head, some people call it intrusive thought.

So I'd remove it.

Yeah. So you have to do it.

You have to.

You have to do that thing that is in your head or it won't go away.

And I remember you struggled with change, okay? Like, you didn't like to leave the house, but your house was your world and you could control everything in your house. And I do remember that something that seemed to be a trigger for you is if. And this was problem living with me because my life, my schedule can change on a dime. So someone who really, you know, you would ask me in the morning, what are you doing today? And you wanted to know what I was doing today. And if something came in and that switched. I remember a lot of times that was a trigger for you. Yeah. Anything that changed the kind of way you saw that thing going inside your mind would be a trigger sometime for panic. Do you remember that?

Yeah, I remember it was. I think it was. I would ask that, and I would ask the same thing at nighttime. I would have to, you know, I would sit there and say my prayers, and I would say them a certain way, but to the OCD thing. Like, some people. Some people are weird. Like, some people wash their hands every five seconds or whatever. But mine were little random things like. Like that. I wouldn't like a germ freak, but, you know, light switches and like, random things. Like you had to have your toothbrush sitting this way.

Or like, you're so you did not like your food.

It was like. Yeah, it was weird. Like, with food.

He didn't like his food to touch. Yeah. He would eat everything we ate, but he didn't touch you.

And the thing is, like, it drove me crazy just as much as it drove everyone else crazy, but I couldn't help it. Like, I couldn't stop it. And especially when, like, you know, now that I'm older, you learn to, like, how to fight those things, and I've overcame that, thank God. But at that time, you don't. You don't know what's happening.

You don't have the. When you're a child. Yeah, when you're a child, you don't have the skills to confront it yourself. That's what I try to tell people. Because when people go out seeking medicine, you know, some of the ones that are more along the lines of what I come from. Well, you shouldn't do that. You should just. Well, the fact is, when you, you know, if you're 27 years old, you can go seek some help. And what's some things I can do when I feel this coming on that I can execute, that can help me battle it. When you're five years old and you see your child actually sometime almost crossing over the line of. Into suffering, the fact is, you know, you need to get them to help. And the help may not be training or teaching or something that somebody can tell you because you're so young.

Yeah. And I Could I remember, you know, I went to, like I said, I went to multiple schools and a lot of them were schools that you guys, you know, tried to seek out. Yeah, tried to seek out and specifically find to help me. But I remember sometimes one of those schools was a school that was designed specifically for, for kids who had dyslexia and other things like that. And I was still young. I was, I was just, had gone into sixth grade or something like that. And I didn't even really understand what that was. But I remember no one else except the, the school chair or supervisor, whatever, let me into that school because y' all had had a meeting with them and let me in. So no one else could go in that school unless you had dyslexia or some other, you know, mental dysfunction or something. So I was in there. And I remember none of the, none of the teachers or the students know that I don't have that. But I just, I have, I just, I needed more time. I needed one on one time. So that's why they let me there. So I remember all the other teachers would tell me that I had dyslexia or they told me that I had some sort of like dysfunction and that and that like really like weighed down on me. So I would go home every day and I would say I didn't know I had something else wrong.

Something wrong with me.

Yeah, there's something and there's something. This is. I'm here because I'm different from everyone else. I can't be like anyone else. So I'm supposed to feel this way because they put this on me.

Yeah.

So that's, that's another thing you have to go home and think about is, okay, well, they take, they go to take me in the school so I can get help. But at the same time I'm being told I have another issue.

And you know, and that really was not the case. Yeah, let me go right here. We got, we got a sponsor. Do not click out because, man, I want you to hear these sponsors. We love our sponsors and we are clients of our sponsors. So most, if not all of the products that we bring to you, we're so grateful for them and at the same time we use these products. But over over 80 million men and women in the US experience thinning hair, yet it is not openly talked about. What you can make going through it feel scary and stressful and just adds to the problem. I tried Nutrafol. Nutrafol is the number one dermatologist recommended hair growth supplement clinically Shown to improve hair growth, thickness, visible scalp coverage for men and for women. Did you know that there are multiple causes of thinning hair? Nutrafol is a hair growth supplement that goes beyond genetics to target stress hormones, nutrition, metabolism, aging and lifestyle factors that may be impacting your hair. Thinning is different for men than women. So Nutrafol has multiple unique formulas for men and women to provide exactly what they need based on their biology and based on their age. Every formula is a physician formulated using natural medical grade ingredients for allowable results without compromises in clinical studies. 72%. That's incredible. 72% of men saw more scalp coverage and 86% of women saw improved hair growth after six months. Nutrafol is also trusted and recommended by more than 3,000 top doctors. You can grow thicker, healthier hair. Support our show by going to nutrafol.com and entering the promo code R. We need you to do that. Rah. To save $15 off your first month subscription. This is their best offer anywhere and it's only available to US customers for a limited time plus free shipping on every order. Get $10 off at nutrafol.com spelled n u t r a f o l.com promo code r a H. We love our guys at Nutrafol. I am a client of that and would certainly, certainly love if you would check that out for us. Now he was talking about putting you in that school as a parent. Let me go back to where we were. I knew my son was struggling. I knew that there was not anything that I wouldn't do for my son. But I didn't know what he was struggling with. So if I don't even know what you're struggling with, I certainly don't know how to help. So I was trying to seek out people that could and having that to do over, I would have never allowed that to happen because there's some things that we find out later we didn't find out at the time. Why? Because you're in the sixth grade. You didn't come on talking about all the things that they're trying to tell you. You were never dyslexic, you never had any of that. We were just trying to find you that atmosphere where you could get one on one teaching and an atmosphere where you felt comfortable and didn't feel threatened. I don't know that we ever succeeded in that. I know we tried. I know you tried. But until you finally came home and homeschooled.

Yeah, so I remember I came home and homeschooled and I did that for, like, what, three years? It's like three years, something like that.

Up till 13th. 13th, I think.

So it was like, almost three years. And then I just. I remember I had gone through this and I hadn't mentioned the. The doctors and therapists and things yet. I had. We had. I had gone to therapists in Greenville and. And multiple, like, doctors. And, you know, I'd go in there and I went once a week, and I'd go in there to my therapist, and she would put, you know, the little. The sensors on my head, she'd put the little. The gel material.

I remember you liked her.

Yeah, she was. You, like, really helped me a lot.

But you're a little bit older and you have the ability to get training and manage it.

Yeah, so. And like you said, too, about a lot of people, mindsets or, you know, people of faith, they just think that prayer will solve every little thing. And it will. I believe that myself. But I also think that God has specifically placed people on earth that can help you. Doctors, absolutely. Nutritionists and things like that. And she was one of those that helped me. And she would sit there and she'd make me play little games, but the whole time I didn't know they were games where she was testing my brain and, like, my brain waves and how I was thinking and how it was. Functions and things like that. And, you know, and she would teach me skills and how to. How to calm myself down and tricks and things like that when I felt a panic attack coming on. And she really helped me. And then. But I remember one day, this is probably just one day after school or we all went out to dinner and we went to Fuddruckers. For those of you who know what Fuddruckers is, it's like a burger place.

Build a huge hamburger.

Burger.

Yeah, it's a good burger. And we were there, and I tapped you on the shoulder, and I remember I just asked you if we could. If you could come outside with me and. Because I just wanted to talk to you. And me and you sat. I remember we sat on the floor, on the concrete, on the little. Little pavement step. And I just sat there and I started crying. And I remember you were crying, and I just told you, I said, I'm done with this. You know, I can't do this no more. I can't live like this no more. I don't. I don't. My. You know, I aggravate my friends. I aggravate my family because they don't know what's wrong with me, and it sucks. And I can't go out and do anything. I can't live a normal childhood up until eighth grade, which. Which sucked, but. And I. I sat there and I cried, and I had just been so, so sick of it. The doctors and the. And the medication. I had taken probably seven or eight different pills every morning combined between vitamins and other things. And I just didn't want to live like that. I didn't want to grow up and be that way. And we sat there and we prayed, and I told you, I said, I'm going to do whatever it takes just to get off of this and to just not let this control me. And you sat there and you told me, well, I'll be right with you, you know, every step of the way. And I'm. You know, I'm going to be by your side and I'm not going to.

We spent a lot of time together during those years. We spent a lot of time.

And I would travel with you and I'd hang out at your office and things like that. But I remember, like, it just came to a point where in my mind, I had to just make a decision because I realized that as I got a little older that, you know, I was in control of 90% of my feelings. And no matter if they were intrusive thoughts or anxiety or whatever, I was in control of myself, you know, and you hear people say that all the time, but it's hard for someone to accept that when you're dealing with anxiety. But it was a truth. And, you know, you always taught me you have to take your thoughts captive and you have to cast them out, you know, any negative thought, and you just have to replace them with. With higher thoughts and godly thoughts and positive things and. And you can't focus on the negative and. And always be worried 24, 7. And I just had to put that into action. Like, I actually had to do it. And, you know, because I was always. I would always run to my comfort zone, like you said. I would either go to my room and just not want to deal with it, or as soon as I felt that, that worry come on, I would just go somewhere to where I wouldn't have to deal with it. And you can't. You can't be 30, 40, 50 years old and live like that. So I just. Day by day, I would do smaller things, you know, I would. Okay, small victims this day. Today I'm going to go to my friend's house for 30 minutes or an hour or. Or whatever.

Small Victor.

And then, and then, you know, even if it was an issue, because no one wants, no parent wants to take their kid to their friend's house for an hour. Cuz then they got to drive back and pick them up. But when you, you know, when you know what's happening, you'll do that for them. So, you know, I would go there for an hour and I would hang out and then it was weird cuz I didn't do things like that. But then I would come back and I'd be like, okay, I made it. I survived.

I survived it. I, I got it.

It, it wasn't that bad. And then, you know, next couple weeks I would do more things or I, I'd go out to eat. It was as simple as going to a movie. I couldn't even go to the movies. You know, I, it was just too much for me to handle. But I would do those things back up.

And I'm not saying I'm a superhero, but now you would just about go anywhere with me.

Yeah, I would go. It was.

But with friends or by yourself or something like that. You wouldn't do it. But I'm. If I want to go to moon.

Yeah.

Me and you go together. You. I think you found some level of comfort in being with me because if I stuck you in the car with me, you didn't really care where we went.

Yeah. And, and I don't think that was like. I mean, obviously y' all are my parents. I love y'. All. And, and I, you know, but I don't think there was some weird like emotional attachment thing that I had. I don't think there was like an abandonment issue. I just think it was. Yeah. Y' all knew me for comfort.

Yeah.

And I could, I could, if I were to get anxious or nervous, I could be that around y'.

All.

Because you knew that.

Right. That's a good way to put. Now let me, let me interject something here. As a parent. The medicine thing was brutal. We went.

I changed, I changed medicine like four times.

Yeah. Now I will tell you this hopefully was pushing that. Our son is young. He don't have the skill set to manage this on his own. What he's feeling, it was bad. It was bad. Especially the school part. That was where it really manifested the worst. And, and I didn't want to see him go through it and I didn't want to him to feel the embarrassment of having those feelings and those breakouts in public. Yeah. I didn't want, you know, if you're going to deal with it, deal it around. Two people who love you and understand it. I didn't want you to deal with it publicly. And it seemed like school was a huge trigger. A mole wasn't really a trigger, but school was a trigger.

But at the same time, I knew what y' all were trying to do. You were trying to force me out of my comfort zone.

I was. And your mom was. Now your mom was. He needs help, he needs some medicine. And I'm going to be honest with you, I thought that for a while I fought that because number one of my faith and number two, I was just being hard headed and didn't know what I was dealing with. But I'm not going to lie to you, the medical part was brutal because number one, they try to find the right medicine. Once you find the right medicine, then they start trying to find the right dosage and then side effects. Then you got the side effects. Then I know one time you gained a lot of weight and you've never, I mean, you've always been lean and thin. One time you started tasting something, you started gaining a lot of weight. And then we find out, well, this after three doses, this really ain't the medicine. Let's go to another medicine. That part as a parent was excruciating. Watching what I call just the guinea pig effect. The doctors are doing the best they can. They're trying to find out what works. But in the meantime, you were going through all these different range of emotions. And I remember that was brutal on me as a parent to watch you.

Go through because you get all these, you get so many different chemical imbalances because you're taking one medicine and then they take you off.

I remember one of them that made you change that. You went from this cool, quiet, calm, collected kid who kind of did his video games and you had animals, you loved your animals. But I remember you started taking this one medicine and man, you were out of control. I mean, you turned our house into like a gymnastics thing. I mean, you flipping here and flipping there. And we knew that was not your personality. We knew that that had been medically induced. And we went immediately back and said, this ain't the one. That was a brutal, brutal process. And we didn't handle everything right. And I've apologized a million times because I was not as a parent, I was not qualified. I had no point of reference. You know, most time, you know, if something like that has been in the family, there's a point of reference. But when you started your struggle, I had no frame of reference. But let me tell you what did happen in your struggle. My father came to me and I'll try to do this without getting emotional and made a confession of his awful struggles with anxiety and ocd. My dad telling me things about the light switch. I never knew that my dad talking about this process he would have to go through before he laid down his bed at night. And he could not break that process. He had to do every one of these little things. My dad told me how he was a kid, he would sit there, lay there at night and he'd have to have his feet pointed straight up. And he was scared to let his feet. And I'm like, wow.

Wow.

And guys, let me tell you, I'll fight the world for my dad. I've never known a greater man than my dad. But the fact is when families don't talk. If my dad would have told me that understanding, I would have had some frame of reference. You know what, this thing's in our family and now Chaz is dealing with it generational. And I did not. I didn't know that. Okay, then, you know, some other things I dealt with that I'll talk about in a moment. But I just want to write again. We're blessed enough to have two sponsors in this podcast and I just want to pause a minute and let's just let you know who else is sponsoring us today.

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When did you come down the steps? One morning and it kind of scared me because the kind of medicines you were on, you just don't quit taking them. They actually say it can be very dangerous. And they tell people, don't ever, ever do that. But you came down the stairs one morning and just said it. I'm not taking no more medicine or something. Do you remember that?

I do. I just. It was like I said, I just. I was tired of it. And I just. Like, I was. I built up after that for so long dealing with it. It was like just a determination, sheer determination, that I'm gonna. That I'm just gonna. I'm just gonna do it. Whatever I have to do. Like, no matter how many comfort zone stepping outs, I have to do whatever. I was just gonna beat it because I didn't want to. I didn't want to live that way. I wanted. I wanted to just be like, just a normal kid.

And then you asked to go to school.

Yeah, and I asked to go to school. And I remember that. That next week me and mom went to go visit middle school. Beck and I just. I basically, we just walked around, just toured while they were in class. And I was like, all right, yeah, this is what. This is what I'm gonna do. So this is. I went back to school.

This was public school. This was no special.

This was 8th grade public school. So I went back to school for the first time in eighth grade public school. And I mean, it was one of my. One of my best years. And that's probably when I would say eighth grade is when I came out of that thing fully, pretty much. Because not only, you know, everyone deals with anxiety to a normal extent. Everyone does.

I remember sitting on the. While you were in your worst. I remember I ended up on a plane. I think this was God, with a clinical psychologist sat right beside her. And I said, I know you're on a plane and you don't want to work. I said, but I'm just going to tell you, I got a son that's struggling, and I'm going to ask you some questions. And she told me, she said, sir, she says, everybody has some level of anxiety or nobody to ever get anything done.

Yeah, it's normal.

She said, it's anxiety that makes you get up and take a bath. It's anxiety that makes you get your work done. It's anxiety that makes you clean up your house. I never thought about it like that. But then she said, but then there are anxiety disorders for no reason. You have. There are things where you feel the anxiety, but there's no reality in front of you or no challenge in front of you. Now I heard A very famous podcaster, whom I really enjoyed listening to a while back, say he didn't think there was anything as clinical anxiety. Now, I'm going to tell you, as much as I love this guy, take great issue with that. He said he thought it was just all people, unmanaged thought lives. He like, you keep your mind positive, you're going to be peaceful. You let your mind be filled with negative things, you're going to have torment. I can go to the Bible and prove that. But I watched you have things that were out of your control. You got them under your control, but when you were small, they were out of your control. Now, I had never experienced panic attack or anything else, but here again, this didn't help any, but me and mom went through our thing when you were in high school. It was awful. Brought a lot of turmoil, a lot of stress on our house. It was everywhere in the media, and we were just getting killed from every side. Everybody that ever wanted to see us fall was taking shots, throwing darts and having their field day. And our downfall was people's entertainment. And it's sad, but it was a tough reality. I remember the hurt from what happened in our marriage and then us being separated. I remember there are some people that can have panic attacks, not because there's a disorder, but because of a trauma. I remember during that time of separation, in the middle of the night, I actually ended up getting hospitalized. I got hospitalized because I went 22 days with no sleep. I thought I was losing my mind and I couldn't sleep and I couldn't breathe. I didn't know why I couldn't breathe. I couldn't breathe. They thought I was having a heart attack. The media was so bad, I had to go into the hospital under an alias. And all of a sudden, I remember laying there and saying, this is what you are feeling. I'm a grown man and I'm trying to get on top of it. You were five, six years old trying to get on top of it. And it gave me a whole new grace when I experienced it myself, because it was not fun. So I said this. I want you to do two things. I want you to end it, Chaz. And we're short on time, so about two minutes apiece. What would you say to the young person struggling with what you struggle with? And then what would you say to the parents? Go.

That'S tough.

Just an encouragement. What would you do?

I would say to. And this doesn't necessarily just apply to young people. I would say, like he said, I mean, you could be a grown man dealing with it, or you could be 12 years old or it don't, don't really matter because anxiety doesn't discriminate. So. But I would just say, kind of like I did, there has to come a point to where you have to confront it. You have to confront it and you have to want. You have to want it for yourself and you have to not want to be the same person and have to deal with it because you, you and you have to want to be able to leave your comfort zone because if you're just. If you can always continue to go back to your comfort zone, always continue to be the same person. So you have to want something different. And you, you also have to do something different if you want something different. So I would say get people around you. You know, it don't have to be a lot of people. I had very small friend group. I had maybe two or three friends, but people that actually understand you, they.

Loved you and they understood you.

People who love you for who you are and know that, okay, even though this person's dealing with this, you know, I'm going to ride it out with them, but, you know, I'm also going to try to bring them out of what they're in and not. Not let them just be complacent and struggle. And I had friends that did that. I had friends that would, you know, that would always kind of push me to do something else to just get me out. So, you know, I would say that you have to, you have to know the truth and stop, stop settling for these lies in your head because it's all just the trick of the enemy. And I had, I found that out the hard way. But as you get older, you start to realize it's all just lies and you believe them constantly. And the, the enemy just throws things in your head and it don't take very long to. Once you get that thought, you start to feel it and it starts to become real, even though it's not real, but it feels real to you, it.

Feels real to you.

And so you just have to continue to do things and step out. And I would say if you are someone who takes multiple medications for it and you take a bunch. You know, it's hard for me to say this because I don't know everyone's situation, but, you know, sometimes less is better. You know, less is more. And I know some people do, are diagnosed, they do have to have something specifically for them. Medically, they need it. But, you know, once I started Backing off of my medicine, that haziness in my head started to clear up more. I realized as I got a little older, it just. I started to think better and, like, more clear. Even though the medicine was helping me for a while there was numbing you. It was numbing me to things that I needed to help myself.

Right.

And I had to have a clear mind to be able to do that. So, you know, I'm not going to sit here and tell you to get off your medicine. I'm just saying that you got to confront it. What you're saying is you can't use.

Things to say, I'm going to be numb and I'm going to go in my room forever. You've got to confront it. What would you say to the parents of those who have someone really struggling like that in their family?

I would just say to any parent, you have to be. You have to try to be as understanding as you can. And even if you don't understand what's happening, you have to let them, make them feel like you do. Because if you. If they. If as. As a child, if you feel like your parent understands you, then the level of. The level of comfort will just. Will just build and you'll begin to trust them more and you'll be able to tell them more things that maybe you're struggling with that they don't know about. So just, you have to have understanding and let them know that you're there for them. And I would also say, you know, pray with them and, you know, have nights of prayer, because we did that.

Growing up many times.

I remember what we would do is it would be out of the week. It would be Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday. But each. Each night we'd go to a different room. So maybe Monday we'd go to my room. The whole family would come to my room. Tuesday it'd be Chase's room. Wednesday, challenge room. And we'd all pray in the room together as a family, but we would just switch rooms each night.

And you remember pleading the blood?

Yeah, I remember that. So you walk out and plead the blood over the door and, and, and find. Find words in. In Scripture that speaks and confronts the anxiety, because that's what. That's what you did. And, and I learned on my own, too. And I still have those things today is, you know, there's. There are scriptures and words specifically in the Bible that speak directly against anxiety and tell. And tell you what to do and tell you how to fight it and how to manage it and ultimately how to Break it. And you know, that's. That's what made me. That's how I got here.

Oh, you got here today.

And if I didn't, if you didn't teach me those things and I didn't have the drive to do it on my own after, you know, you guys are kind of there for me, then I would, I wouldn't be here today where I am. I might be in my room still somewhere, just sitting in the corner.

Well, I'm going to give kudos to you. I do think that after we called on, we rallied around you to do what we can to give you the tools to succeed. But the fact is, like chase and drugs, nobody around you can will you out of it. There's got to come a day where you. I am confronting this internally. You have to do it because if you're going to win the battle like this or any other battle, it's always going to come from inside of you. It's not going to come from outside. Hey, guys, we love you. I hope this has helped. I hope it's encouraged. I hope it gives some information. If not just us kind of showing you our scars, you know, Jesus had to decide whether or not he was going to go to Thomas and show him his scars. And as painful as it is, I realized that a whole lot more people seem to be touched by my scars and my pain and my failure than they do my trophies and my triumphs. So I've had to learn to be a little bit more vulnerable with my scars.

And I think. I don't want to interrupt you, but I think that's a big thing too. I'll say this for anyone else trying to help anyone struggling with it, but is you have to be, like you said, the vulnerability. You have to be someone who actually speaks out on what's bothering you. Because if you don't tell your parents or whoever takes care of you or your friends or whatever, or if you're just a grown adult, you have to acknowledge it because you can't fix it until you acknowledge it. You have to acknowledge that it is an issue and that it's something that you want to fix and it's something that is bothering you because until you do that, then nothing will happen. You have to acknowledge it. Like you said, you have to be vulnerable. And if no one knows this is something that you deal with and no one can help you. So you have tell your closest friend and hopefully they'll have that kind of heart towards you to help you or tell your mom or tell your dad or, or whatever. But, you know, there's somebody there, though. There's someone that will, that will listen to you.

There's an ear somewhere that'll listen to.

You because there is someone that's gone through the same thing.

So, anyway, well, this has definitely been real raw and relevant. Even though you hadn't had Hope's big smile and big blonde hair on here, you got me and Chaz. Chaz, I appreciate you sharing this. I'm looking forward to the feedback we get on. I really think it's going to help some people and I want you to know we love you. We appreciate you. Download, subscribe, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, like, whatever you got to do. Build the algorithm, get this on more people's computers and phones. Because we are taking the time out to do this because we believe we're talking about topics and ways that we can't do it on a pulpit, but the way that it can get in your life and maybe make a difference and every once in a while make you laugh. Alright, God bless you guys. We love you. Until next time, we'll see you on running Hope. Real raw and relevant.